{"id":62,"date":"2025-12-02T18:10:33","date_gmt":"2025-12-02T18:10:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/adventuresbyruss.com\/?p=62"},"modified":"2025-12-02T18:19:59","modified_gmt":"2025-12-02T18:19:59","slug":"washed-away","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/adventuresbyruss.com\/?p=62","title":{"rendered":"Washed Away"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

BANG! CRASH! A submarine shaped object rips through the floodwaters rushing through downtown Groveland.\u00a0 What is that thing?! Yep, it\u2019s some poor soul\u2019s 500 gallon propane tank.\u00a0 For one hour on March 22, 2018, Main Street became \u201cMain Creek.\u201d A storm cell dumped 12 inches of hail and rain in Tuolumne County and overwheled hundreds of bridges, creeks, and roads, including this historic downtown.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ironically, the original miners of Groveland were bereft of water for most of the year.  California\u2019s six-month-long annual drought was the bane of the would-be-rich prosepctor.  Thankfully, by 1860, the gold hungry men had a relaible source of year round water, the Golden Rock Ditch, complements of Yosemite\u2019s snow fields.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today I am scouting a one mile section of the Ditch that hangs precipitously 2000 feet over the Tuolumne River.  On the way, I reflect on the flood of 2018.  It almost certainly washed parts of it away. \u201cHow much can an 8 foot wide ditch survive after 100 years of non-maintenance?\u201d I wonder. Well I would soon find out. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

My starting point is where the old ditch intersects with the 120 just east of the Groveland Ranger Station entrance.  I could park on the side of the highway to access it but I knew a more fun, albiet bumpier route.  I head out driving east on Ferretti Road. I enter the forest and pass by the mountain bike trail system.  In just a few moments I ascend east on Forest Route 1S21Y looking forward to my destination.  I stop to \u201ctake a break\u201d and I notice shotgun shells littering the ground. \u201cYep, this is a local\u2019s favorite spot,\u201d I think to myself. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I continue to bump along the road noticing charred Ponderosas and cedars.\u00a0 An opening in the canopy greets me at the end of the road.\u00a0 I consider the possibilities of pitching a tent here in the future.\u00a0 Getting out of the car I look at the hill I need to ascend. It\u2019s completely covered in an extremely dense thorny shrub.\u00a0 As I begin to bushwhack I come across an opening. Cow plops litter the ground. \u201cA trail!\u201d I speak in ecxitement.\u00a0 Free range cattle have maintained openings in the chapparal for decades.\u00a0 The bovine is definitely a hiker\u2019s best friend.\u00a0 As I climb I see a flat area about 100 yards above me. It must be the ditch.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I reach the flat area and descend into the waterway.\u00a0 It\u2019s mostly filled in so a small hop is all it takes. Thankfully this part is relatively free of vegetation.\u00a0 The Rim Fire burned through here twelve years ago, revealing the otherwise overgrown channel.\u00a0 I was familiar with the ditch to the west of this point (I explain it in detail in my book link<\/a>) but the eastern direction was a mystery.\u00a0 All I was aware of was that it hugged the 3280 foot contour line, hundreds of feet above the Tuolumne Canyon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Heading east I began to duck, crawl and climb over newly grown brush.\u00a0 Unfortunately, it is buckbrush,\u00a0an extremely thick, sharp, and unwieldy plant that forms impenetrable walls.\u00a0 Well I\u2019ve conquered this plant many times so I push into the thicket.\u00a0 Although partially filled the ditch is in relatively good shape. I continue to press through until I reach the first wash out. The pathway is gone. I look down. Four foot below a ledge has formed. I climb down using a live oak branch, walk a few feet and hoist myself back up. “Would this be the only one?” I ponder.\u00a0 Probably not, I reckon. This section was carved out of the side of a cliff.\u00a0 It would be almost a mile until the ditch would contour away from the canyon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The ditch worsened. Wash out after washout, I climbed down and back up. \u201cCould this whole thing collapse and take me 2000 feet down into the river below?\u201d I thought to myself.  \u201cNope,\u201d  I reasoned, \u201cit\u2019s the end of Summer and everthing is dry and stable.\u201d  As I philosophize about men\u2019s neverending calculations of risk versus reward in the wild, suddenly I see it.  The ditch is gone! One more step would be death. I stop abruptly. I look up and see the Tuolumne Canyon in all its grandeur carving its way up into the Yosemite wilderness. \u201cWell this is it,\u201d I say to myself, \u201cturn around time.\u201d  I only made it one third of the way along the cliffside, but that was enough for me. The thrill of discovering a long lost section of the ditch made the entire trek worth it. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BANG! CRASH! A submarine shaped object rips through the floodwaters rushing through downtown Groveland.\u00a0 What is that thing?! Yep, it\u2019s some poor soul\u2019s 500 gallon propane tank.\u00a0 For one hour on March 22, 2018, Main Street became \u201cMain Creek.\u201d A storm cell dumped 12 inches of hail and rain in Tuolumne County and overwheled hundreds […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-62","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/adventuresbyruss.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/adventuresbyruss.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/adventuresbyruss.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adventuresbyruss.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adventuresbyruss.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=62"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/adventuresbyruss.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":67,"href":"https:\/\/adventuresbyruss.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62\/revisions\/67"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/adventuresbyruss.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=62"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adventuresbyruss.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=62"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adventuresbyruss.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=62"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}